What's wrong with the Atlanta Falcons? A great many things

We've spent an inordinate amount of time wondering what's wrong with the Atlanta Falcons, despite the fact that nothing you or I can do will fix them. It's the equivalent of taking apart a grandfather clock in your garage, despite the fact that you're drunk, have no idea how a clock works, and only have a spatula and sledgehammer on hand.

The Atlanta Falcons are busted, right now, and the simple truth is that we've spent too much time obsessing over who is most at fault, instead of accepting the fact that everything is wrong. This is a team that:

• Has shaky quarterback play
• Has struggled to run the ball for weeks
• Can't block effectively for the pass or the run
• Has no secondary receiving option, and has Julio Jones buried under a pile of bodies on most plays
• Has a defense that can barely get after the passer
• Has a set of linebackers that wouldn't start for at least half the NFL
• Has a secondary not quite good enough to compensate for all that
• Has a coaching staff unable to improve or fix this team
  
• Has a front office that has built this mess

And so on. There is a litany of things wrong, and we're better off accepting that there are miles to go before this Falcons team is good, and all we should really care about is whether the right people are here to begin the next epoch of quality Falcons football, no matter how far away that might be. If you don't trust the Falcons themselves to make the

This would normally be the part where I'd offer you some hopeful note or solution, but I'm out of those. You and I have to scrounge up a little enjoyment where we can these last three weeks, and then we'll blitz the offseason with the kind of gusto we don't see the Falcons blitzing the quarterback with. For now, this team is bad for myriad reasons, and there's little they can do to fix the majority of them until 2015 mercifully draws to a close.

It's just time to accept that.